


darkly bright

by squilf



Category: Alien Quadrilogy (Movies), Alien Series
Genre: Bishop is a Sentient iPhone, F/M, M/M, Other, Overnight Charging is Worryingly Erotic, Reader-Insert, Robot Feels, Robot/Human Relationships, Robots, Sleep Deprivation, This Movie Came Out in 1986 What am I Doing, This Was Meant to be Just Headcanons, Vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-25
Updated: 2020-01-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:14:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22409290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/squilf/pseuds/squilf
Summary: You go into hypersleep in 2030. You wake up in 2173. Bishop is the first android you’ve ever seen, and you’re scared, but he wants to win your trust.Bishop/Reader (of any gender).
Relationships: Lance Bishop/Reader
Comments: 5
Kudos: 97





	darkly bright

**Author's Note:**

> I put a [call-out](https://squilf.tumblr.com/post/190163855040/very-niche-but-i-feel-like-writing-some-reader-x) for Bishop x Reader prompts up on tumblr, and I was so thrilled to receive a prompt. This was written for [riddlemethissj](https://riddlemethissj.tumblr.com/)’s prompt: _you were in hypersleep before androids were created but years later they find you, but you're still trying to get used to Bishop being unusually quiet and him scaring you but trying to win your trust_. (I know you only asked for headcanons, but, what can I say? You inspired me.)
> 
> I tried to make this kind of accurate to the _Alien_ -verse, but there were a lot of things I couldn’t find information about or just didn’t fit in the timeline, so don’t shoot me.

Consciousness hits you like a rush of cold air. Your breath comes in gasps, your skin is blazing hot-cold-hot, your eyes are blinded by light.

“You’re alright, you’re alright.”

Someone’s talking to you, and your ears are dampened but the sound is calm, reassuring. And then someone’s touching you, and you try to push them away but you’re flailing, ungainly, like you’re trying to move through water. You fall onto your hands and knees, bones connecting with a cold, hard floor, and you’re thrown off-kilter, like the world has tilted on its axis and sent you tumbling upside down.

Your throat is burning and you’re vomiting, hot acrid liquid spilling down your front, onto your hands. Your arms collapse under your own weight, weak and shaking, landing face-down in vomit.

“I’ve got you, you’re alright.”

You’re being pulled up, strong arms supporting you, and you’re still vomiting, your diaphragm convulsing with each heave.

“Ain’t much of a sleeping beauty,” says someone else, someone further away, and that’s the last thing you hear before black spots crowd across your vision.

* * *

There’s consciousness after that, but it’s patchy. White sheets and a cannula in your arm and voices. You hear words – _hypersleep_ and _years_ and _dehydrated_ – but nothing that makes sense, nothing that you can fit together into a sentence.

* * *

“Ah, sleeping beauty finally wakes.”

When you awake – _truly_ awake – you’re in a hospital bed, with a woman standing over you. A doctor, you think, but then you see her uniform. Military. You recognise the Weyland logo, but it doesn’t look like the one on your flightsuit.

“Before you ask, you’re on board the USS _Sulaco_ ,” She says, “We found your little ship drifting along without a pilot. Weyland-Yutani property, so we pulled you in.”

The woman nods towards someone else, someone you can’t quite see.

“I’m Dietrich, this is Bishop. You were sick on him. A lot.”

You try to raise your head, to sit up, but you’re too weak, your arms are like jelly. The man – Bishop – goes towards you.

“I’ve got you,” he says, lifting you as if you weigh nothing to prop you up.

His voice is familiar.

“Oh,” you say, shame-faced, “I remember.”

Dietrich laughs.

“Don’t worry. Nothing got into his circuits.”

“Sorry,” you say quietly to Bishop, while he’s close to you.

He smiles.

“That’s alright,” he says, with a gentle manner that puts you at ease.

You rest back on the pillows, and, satisfied that you’re comfortable, he leaves your side.

“You know, it’s strange,” Dietrich continues, “We saw your dog tags. But we couldn’t find any record of you on the Weyland-Yutani employee database. Or any information about your ship.”

“My ship’s the USCSS _Conrad_ ,” you say, “Registration number 11071. Launched 2030.”

“2030?” Dietrich repeats.

You nod.

“It’s one of the new ships equipped with a hypersleep chamber – that’s the pod I was in. It sends your body into a kind of stasis, you can stay that way for months at a time.”

“Years,” Bishop says.

“Maybe, when the technology is developed,” you say.

“No,” Bishop says, “You’ve been in hypersleep for years.”

You frown.

“The limit on induced hypersleep is sixty-three days. The FDA regulated it, for safety. Nothing more has even been tested.”

Dietrich stares at you.

“How the hell are you still alive?”

Bishop turns to face her.

“Hypersleep suspends cell function. In theory, it can be indefinite. In practice, it can only continue with a constant power supply. Which the _Conrad_ must have, somehow, maintained.”

“What’s going on?” you say, panic rising.

“It’s 2173,” Dietrich says, “You’ve been sleeping for a hundred years, princess.”

* * *

Your ship must have malfunctioned. That’s about all you can figure out. Something went wrong with your hypersleep chamber and it never woke you up. With no one manning the controls your ship went off course, drifting far deeper into space than it was ever built for. Weyland must have lost contact before long, and reported you as missing, presumed dead. And now, by chance, you’ve been picked up by one of their own warships. 143 years later.

* * *

Bishop tells you what you’ve missed in human history. Weyland-Yutani, technological developments, planetary colonisation, wars – a lot of wars. You sit and listen, numb, not really taking it all in.

“There’s something else,” he says, eventually, “Robotics weren’t very advanced when you left earth, were they?”

“AIs were developing,” you say, “I think Sir Peter Weyland was working on something in cybernetics. But it was contested by some Japanese start-up – there was a press injunction.”

Bishop nods.

“Peter Weyland built the first advanced android model in 2024. The David prototype. By the third generation, David-series androids were used internally at Weyland Industries. By the fourth, they were commercially available. By the sixth, only seven percent of people were able to recognise them as cybernetic, rather than human. Weyland-Yutani have built many android series since. Some of the most recent were designed by Michael Bishop.”

“And… you’re Michael Bishop?” you say.

“No. I’m one of his creations.”

You stare at him.

“You’re a robot?”

“I prefer the term ‘artificial person’, but, yes.”

You don’t believe him – you _can’t_ believe him. You want to reach out, to feel that he’s real, but you stop yourself. He sees the tiny aborted movement and takes your hands in his, moves them towards him, silently giving you permission to touch. So you do – his hands, at first, turning them over to examine the way his fingers move, the complex joints and knuckles, the faint hairs on the back of his hands, the smooth ridges of his fingernails – all perfect. You can’t understand how this could be replicated, what materials could be manufactured that look and feel and move so organically. Then you see something – a number, stencilled onto the side of his palm.

“That’s my identification number,” he says.

You trace it with your index finger. It could be a tattoo, or a note written in biro. It reminds you of a time when people used to write their mobile number on someone’s hand. Someone they’d just met, but wanted to see again.

You look up. Bishop’s watching you intently, and you reach up and touch his face. It’s handsome, but not the kind of beauty that’s created. He’s no young Adonis, no classical ideal. His face isn’t even the bland, generic kind generated by composites or computers.

“My appearance is modelled on my creator, Michael Bishop,” he says.

You trace the line of his jaw, his cheekbones. You touch his hair, and it’s soft, not synthetic in texture. His ears, too, the thick cartilage that must be silicone. His neck – you can feel an Adam’s apple, and cords of muscle, and a collarbone.

“I can remove my uniform, if you want to see my full anatomy,” Bishop says.

“No,” you say quickly, moving back, “No, that’s – that’s fine.”

You cough awkwardly.

“I just… it’s still hard to believe.”

Bishop nods.

“I understand,” he says, and then he pinches the skin at the inside of his elbow and peels it back.

There are wires, translucent and white, and metal, and something is _moving_ , and – and you can’t look anymore.

“Put it back,” you say, barely able to contain your horror.

Bishop pushes his skin back into its original place. But now you know what’s there, underneath the surface, and you can’t ignore it. You feel a wave of nausea just trying to process it, the visceral ugliness.

“Can you just –” you gasp, “Can you just leave, please.”

Bishop doesn’t make you ask twice.

* * *

You fall asleep again, and you don’t wake for days. It’s strange, losing time. Losing days doesn’t feel very different to losing years. When you drift back into consciousness, you remember where you are and what’s happened to you, and it makes you want to cry until you fall asleep again.

“How are you feeling?”

Bishop’s sat on a chair by your bed. You must look a mess, your hair tangled with sweat, your wet with tears.

“Much better,” you say weakly, “I was only sick three times this morning.”

Your ribs are sore from heaving. Talking hurts. Breathing hurts.

“Your hypersleep chamber was a very early model, and it was a very long period of stasis – far longer than anything I’ve seen recorded. It’s hard to say when the nausea will pass.”

You groan.

“You never tell me anything nice.”

“How are you feeling, apart from that?” Bishop asks.

It’s not a question you want to answer.

“Can’t you tell?” you say, “You know, with your…”

You wave a hand towards him vaguely.

“I can run a programme that detects emotions, but it’s only accurate for the basic categories. I’ve learnt much more from my colleagues here. The theory is quite different to the practice. And I’ve learned it’s best to ask.”

You close your eyes, rub your face with the back of your hand.

“Everyone I know is dead. And the longer I spend awake, the more I realise how terrible that is.”

It’s taken hold of you the past few days, this indescribable sadness. Everyone you have ever known is dead. Your family, your friends, your colleagues, your neighbours. The kids you played with at school. The people you walked past on the street. Everyone who watched as your ship launched into space. You have no human connection left in the universe.

“Grief?” Bishop says, “You’re feeling grief?”

He frowns, like it’s something he’s heard of only in passing. You turn your face away.

“It’s not something I’d expect a robot to understand.”

* * *

The next time you wake up, there’s something on your bedside table – a stack of files. At first, you think it must be your medical notes. But when you open one, there’s a photograph of someone you recognise. Someone who must have died a long time ago. You open another, and another, and you realise that you know all of these people.

It’s the files of your family members, your friends, your colleagues. The people you cared about and the people you’ve lost. Each file tells their story in indifferent lines of text. There are triumphs and failures, lives lived and half-lived, and you cry because you were robbed of the chance to live it with them. But you laugh, too – at who married who, at the family photos, at the strange small joy of feeling close to them again.

After hours poring over the files, you drift asleep, sheets of paper still tangled over the bed. When you wake again, it’s because of a light pressure on your wrist. Your eyes are fuzzy but you can tell it’s Bishop, taking your pulse. His fingers are warm, and it’s strange, you think, that a robot should have warm hands.

“It’s alright,” he says, “Just me.”

“Please don’t touch me,” you say, your voice croaky with sleep.

He moves away.

“Sorry.”

He turns to leave, and you know you don’t want him to go like this.

“Wait,” you say.

He stops.

“Thank you,” you say, “For the files. It was very kind of you.”

He smiles, just a little.

“Get some sleep.”

* * *

Slowly, you grow stronger. You stop being so sick, and start being able to hold food down. The cornbread is starchy and claggy, but it’s food, and you’ve lost so much weight in the past few weeks you’re practically ravenous now.

You take your first tentative steps out of med bay. You’re aching to get out, to see something different from the ceiling and the toilet bowl, so Dietrich straps you into a wheelchair and carts you around. The marines are loud and boisterous and you feel small and weak next to them, but they seem only too pleased to have someone new to show off to. They’ve taken to calling you ‘princess’ – the whole sleeping beauty thing caught on, apparently. Vasquez lets the boys do their showboating, and then she bends down to your level and says, “If anyone causes you trouble, tell me and I’ll cut their balls off.” You’re very glad she’s decided she likes you.

Eventually, you’re moved out of med bay and assigned a bunk in the communal sleeping quarters. It’s the bunk under Vasquez’s, which leads to a predictable amount of jokes. On the first night, Vasquez shows you where she keeps her knife, tucked under the mattress.

“I also have this,” she says, and produces a gun from somewhere in her sleeping-clothes, “But that’s mainly for when Drake tries to touch me.”

“Yeah, you wish!” Drake shouts from his bunk.

The sleeping quarters, you quickly realise, are not the best place for a rest. Around you, the crew snuffles and snores, constantly shifting in their sleep. The bedsprings creak and groan with each movement. Hudson even talks in his sleep, seemingly unable to keep his mouth shut in any state of consciousness. It’s no wonder Hicks has developed a talent for dozing off anywhere, anytime. You, meanwhile, lie awake.

* * *

You’ve had enough sleep for a dozen lifetimes, but after a few nights tossing and turning and getting more exhausted and frustrated, you’re dead on your feet and desperate for a rest. You wait for the now-familiar chorus of snores before you slip out of the sleeping quarters and search for a quiet nook to tuck yourself into. You don’t have a key pass – you’re not an official crew member, you’re not even legally _alive_ – so you’re not sure if you’ll be able to get in anywhere. But the door to the navigation room has been left open, so you pad inside. It looks empty. The lights are down, and there’s only the faint, warm glow of the consoles to see by. A huge reinforced window stretches out in front and above you, framing a sky that’s black yet filled with starlight.

“Are you alright?”

The voice makes you jump. It’s Bishop, in one of the seats you thought were unoccupied.

“Sorry, I was just looking for somewhere to sleep,” you say, “Hudson’s talking in his sleep about bugs again.”

“I charge here, most nights,” Bishop says, “I have my lab, but I like to see the stars.”

You smile bemusedly. It’s a romantic notion, especially for a robot.

“It is a great view,” you say, looking up into the darkness of space.

You’re so far from earth – so far from the solar system – that there’s nothing here that you recognise. It’s just pretty lights to you. Bishop hisses, a sharp intake of breath that sounds like he’s in pain.

“Are you okay?” you ask.

He nods. He’s holding a cable in one hand and the other is on his stomach – his flightsuit’s open, undone to the waist.

“I just need to access my charging port.”

You move towards him, hover awkwardly by his side.

“Would you do it for me?” he asks.

“I don’t know…” you say.

“I’ll tell you how.”

He presses down on his stomach, around the place where an appendix might be on a human, and something protrudes out beneath the skin, and you don’t – you don’t want to see this.

“Pinch it between your fingers, and pull,” Bishop says.

And, somehow, you do. Your hands shake a little as you touch the synthetic skin, fingers closing around the small protrusion beneath, and pull as gently as you can. A square section of the skin, about the size of your thumb, comes away. It’s attached to a mechanical structure, metal and encased in wires, that extends out a few inches from the stomach.

“That’s enough,” he says.

You let go, feeling something warm drip onto your finger. The metal structure is coated in liquid, thick and white.

“Is that… blood?” you ask.

“Yes. Artificial. Impervious to disease or infection, so it’s as safe to you as engine oil.”

He smiles reassuringly. You’re not sure if you’re reassured.

“There’s a port on the side of the actuator, on your right,” he continues, “Five millimetres in diameter. It’s hard to see but you can feel it.”

“You want me to…”

“It’s beneath the wires. Just reach in and find it.”

You take a breath and push aside the wires, running your fingers along the metal within to feel for the port. It’s warm and wet, the blood almost greasy against your fingers, but soon you feel it – a definite indentation.

“I think I’ve got it,” you say.

“Now attach this.”

He passes you a cable ending in a single-pronged connection. You move it into the place where you felt the port. It’s awkward, the other wires blocking your way, and there’s a scrape of metal on metal as you push it home. Then it clicks into place.

“Is that right?” you ask.

“Yes, a full connection. You can retract the actuator. It can stay in place for the duration of the charge.”

“All the way?” you ask, starting to push it back into his stomach.

“Yes.”

You push until skin reconnects with skin, and it looks as though the cable is disappearing inside him.

“Is that it?” you say.

“Yes. All done.”

“Did I do it right?”

“Yes.”

“And it didn’t hurt?”

“No.”

You smile, suddenly very relieved.

“Thank you,” he says, and he smiles, and you feel like you’re too close.

You’re still bent over him – and oh, your hands are still on his stomach. You clear your throat and move back.

“So, how… how long does it take you to charge?” you say, mainly for reason of saying _something_.

“Eighteen hours for a full charge. But I never run down fully, and I have a spare battery reserve that gives me the equivalent of an extra five per cent. Most nights, it takes between six and eight hours to recharge. It’s designed to mimic human sleep cycles.”

You nod, not really listening, avoiding his eyes.

“I haven’t really slept since I got here,” you admit.

Bishop reaches into his pocket and hands you something. His key pass.

“Med bay’s empty,” he says.

* * *

Even in the cot in med bay, sleep comes to you in starts and stops. You wake from a dream, sweating and breathless. Lying awake, you turn the key pass over in your hands, studying it in the half-light. _Executive Officer Lance Bishop, USS Sulaco._ You repeat it quietly to yourself, _Lance_. It seems strange, that he has a first name. He isn’t smiling in the photo. You realise that seems strange, too. You realise that’s because he always smiles at you.

Bishop’s still sleeping when you find him the next morning. He’s completely still. His chest doesn’t rise and fall, his eyelids don’t twitch with REM sleep. You quietly slip the key pass back into his pocket. He doesn’t stir.

* * *

You’re too scared of getting caught to sleep anywhere other than your bunk for a while. So you try to be useful, to keep yourself busy. You’re not allowed to join the exercise drills, a long way off passing the medical yet, and there’s not much you’re qualified to do, your understanding of technology over a century out of date. But there’s work that always needs to be done and no one ever wants to do – washing, cleaning, cooking – and you get to know people while you do it. Hudson whines constantly, but Hicks is good company, and Frost thaws a little when you ask him about his previous missions.

You try not to look at Bishop, but it’s not because you don’t want to. Something about that night in the navigation room changed things. You were scared, the first time you saw what was inside him. But touching him, helping him – you weren’t scared anymore. You still find yourself thinking about it, remembering how it felt. Maybe Bishop does too, because he looks at you, sometimes. And he smiles, so you smile back. It’s for that reason – and another dozen reasons – that you finally sneak out of your bunk again.

“Hey, princess!”

You freeze. The whispered voice came from above you. It’s Vasquez, giving you a shit-eating grin.

“Give Bishop a kiss from me,” she says.

You hesitate for a second, blindsided. Vasquez just laughs and shakes her head, lying back in her bunk.

* * *

The door to the navigation room is open, like it was before, almost as if you’re expected.

“Do you want to sleep in med bay?” Bishop says.

“That depends,” you say, “Can you charge in med bay?”

* * *

Bishop can, apparently, charge at any power source – something you become very aware of as he sits on the cot in med bay and unzips his flightsuit.

“Can I, um…?” you say.

He nods.

“I think I remember it,” you say, “Tell me if I’m doing it wrong.”

Your fingers brush across his stomach, trying to find the right spot. You make a few failed attempts, your hands clumsy.

“Sorry,” you say, but then you find it, the tiny button sinking in and then emerging, puckering the skin.

You bite your lip as you pull, gentle but firm, extending the internal metal structure a few inches. Then you feel for the port, coating your fingers with white blood as you push the wires aside. It doesn’t take long now that you know where it is. Bishop passes you the cable, and it’s easier than last time, the connection slotting into place.

“Connected?” you ask.

Bishop nods, so you push everything back into place, the skin reconnecting with no visible seam.

“How did I do?” you ask.

“Very well.”

You smile, and he smiles back, and you suddenly feel keenly that you’re both out of place, out of time, only existing in the same moment by chance. You were never meant to live to see people built from metal and plastic. He was never meant to be seen by people like you. He was built to serve new masters.

You want to tell Bishop that you’re sorry. That you were afraid, but you’re not anymore. That you’re grateful for his kindness, for his patience. But you don’t know how to say it. You don’t know if you really have the words. You sit next to him on the cot. Maybe you don’t need to say anything.

“Can you touch me?” you say.

“How?”

“As I touched you.”

You slip your hands into Bishop’s and pull them closer. He looks down at them, and then he touches you – the blunt edges of your fingernails, the wrinkled skin across your knuckles, the delicate joints of your fingers. He turns your hands palm-up and draws a line in the exact same spot as his identification number, mimicking your movements perfectly. But there are a few of his own as well –tracing the blue lines of your veins, the delicate bird-bones of your wrist. The markers of what makes you different. That you were born and he was built.

And then he reaches up and touches your face. He looks at you with neither love nor judgement. It’s intense but gentle, as though he wants to get the measure of you. He touches your hair, your forehead, your ears, your nose. Your cheekbones he draws his thumbs across, both at once. He traces the outline of your mouth, and then he touches your lower lip, seemingly surprised at its softness. Your lips feel dry, and you lick them on instinct, your tongue brushing the pads of his fingers. He makes a sound at that, small and surprised. It makes you want to do it again. You don’t.

He tips your chin up, exposing the underside of your jaw. You swallow. His fingers move down your neck, to your collarbone – he presses hard against the full length of it, like he wants to know the strength of you. Bone is so much softer than metal.

“You should get some sleep,” he says, and he’s still ever-so gently touching your collarbone.

* * *

Tonight, for the first time in a long time, you sleep – deep and dreamless.

The cot is big enough for two.

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from Shakespeare’s Sonnet 43.
> 
> My [ask](https://squilf.tumblr.com/ask) is still open for Bishop prompts, as NSFW (or not) as you like.


End file.
